Her door was open and it took all of sixty seconds for a strikingly large man, she knew to be thirty-six years old, to appear in the entryway. And true to his military duty, his hair was short, his jaw strong, his expression hard.

“Hello, Ms. Reynolds.”

There was something about the way he said her name, the way it came out almost like a threat, that set a warning bell ringing in her head. “Please, have a seat, Mr. Wilkins.”

For a moment, he stood there, so still, she almost thought he’d frozen in place, turned to stone, before he gave a surprisingly polite, “Thank you,” and claimed a visitor’s chair.

“I assume this is about your sister,” Lauren prodded, eager to get on with this. He was a time bomb she could almost hear ticking.

“I’ll cut to the chase,” he replied, bypassing a direct answer. “I know what Beverly did was wrong, but don’t you think you are being a bit harsh in your quest for the death penalty? I mean the woman was terrorized by her husband.”

Lauren leaned back in her chair, carefully schooling her features into an emotionless mask. “Have you talked to your sister’s attorney about this?”

He let out a bitter laugh. “Funny. That’s exactly what your father asked me.”

She cringed at the idea that her father had been dragged into this, but managed to clamp down on an obvious reaction. “My father is a State Senator. He can’t do anything to help your sister.”

His lips thinned. “So he says.” He shrugged. “I guess that means it’s all on you.”

“Unless you have new evidence to present, Mr. Wilkins, this case is in the jury’s hands.”

He leaned forward and pressed his hands onto the desk. “I’m Special Forces. I was away on a mission. I’m all she has since our father died last year. She married that bastard when I was in deep combat territory, and instead of taking care of her, he beat the crap out of her. Had I been here, things might have been different. Had I even known what was going on, things would have been different.”

“I can see how much this is upsetting you,” she said. “And I understand. But a man is dead and buried, Mr. Wilkins, and his family is in pain. They want his side of the story told.”

He pushed to his feet, his voice rising with him. “I let her down. She was desperate to survive. Don’t you understand her need to end the pure hell she was living? Do you have no heart, Ms. Reynolds?”

Her heart was what made her job both difficult and rewarding. The victim of this crime was dead, but his family painfully lived on. “Look, Mr. Wilkins. I want to help but I need new evidence. Something to clear your sister. Have your sister’s attorney call me. I’ll talk to him.”

He stared down at her, his jaw tight, his breathing a little too fast. “This isn’t over,” he said in a low, threatening voice, before turning and storming out of her office.

Stunned, Lauren read the threat he intended. She watched him leave, fingertips pressed to the top of her desk. It wasn’t until she heard the front lobby door slam that she realized she was holding her breath and her hand was shaking. She exhaled, rattled when she normally wouldn’t be. And she knew why. The calls, the calendar sheets. Royce’s paranoia over them. All those things were messing with her head and that meant whoever sent them was getting their way, and she didn’t want to give them that satisfaction. She had to shake this off.

Her intercom buzzed again and Lauren punched the button. “You okay in there?” Alice asked, concern in her voice.

“Yeah,” Lauren said. “I assume he’s gone?”

“Oh, he’s gone,” she said in a disgusted tone. “And he did so quite loudly.”

“I heard but I wanted to be sure.”

“I called the building security and alerted them when I heard him raise his voice in your office. And you have a call. Mark Reeves.”

Beverly’s attorney, and the timing was just too perfect. “Put him through,” she ground out through her teeth.

Alice transferred the call through, and Lauren answered, and she didn’t hold back, nor did she bother with ‘hello’. “Sending your client’s relatives over here to harass me into giving you a plea deal is not only not cool, it doesn’t seem like your style.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. I just got your message, and was returning your call.”

“I was returning your call from Friday,” she corrected. “And Jonathan Wilkins just paid me a delightful little visit. One that ended in a threat and a slammed door.”

“Ouch, Lauren. I’m sorry. I had nothing to do with that. I talked to him this morning and told him a deal wasn’t looking good for Beverly. He wasn’t happy.”

“No. No, he wasn’t. How about warning me when you have a loose cannon? We might not be on the same team, but we aren’t enemies.”

“He’s Special Ops. I thought he had more control than this. He’s just another reason to put this behind us. Let’s talk plea bargain and avoid the trial. Save us both a lot of time and headaches.”

“Not unless you’ve changed your last proposal.”

“The jury will be sympathetic to a battered woman,” he argued.

“You mean a cold blooded killer who meticulously planned her husband’s slow death. Poison has precedence in the courts. The death penalty is a strong possibility, and you know it.”